I Wish We Had More Time
by FWvidChick
Summary: The Emotions and thoughts behind the first scene in 'Idol' in the alternate timeline.


**Episode: **Idol- the beginning scene but about events from Pandora. Included a little of my own offscreen moment.

This is a _**One shot.**_

❝I Wish We Had More Time ❞

Warmth. A sensation she wanted to be wrapped in, because it wasn't just any warmth, it was his. Though his arms were no longer around her, his body heat from just lying beside him was a reminder of a night unlike any other. She tried to avoid the memories of the day before and thoughts of what were to come. Lois wanted to stay and linger in what happened between them.

She had fallen for this man and truth be told, she had never really expected him to feel for her what she felt for him. But with his words "_I died when you left..."_ she felt something inside her shift - she had believed him. His eyes had been so empty it broke her heart and she wanted to show him. Show him how much he meant to her.

The red rays of the newly risen sun demanded to be noticed, breaking the spell of sleep and wanted comfort. Reluctantly, she pulled herself from the mattress, wrapping the sheet slowly around her as she made her way to what was left of a wall. The wind blew against her, but she did not feel the chill of it, not with what lay before her. She stared out at the broken city, one of many across a crushed world. How had Clark expected to save all these... on his own?

The sight of it all, the desolation of a city she had come to love... Metropolis was imperfect, full of crime and weirdness, but also good people - people who deserved life and liberty and justice. The quiet, empty, barren street below bathed in red light reminded her of the look in Clark's eyes...not just broken but forsaken.

She knew he was behind her before his arms came around her. There it was again, the all too short moment of security and safety that she only felt with him. Briefly closing her eyes, she leaned fully against him. Why did being with him mean this... a world gone wrong? This was not how it was suppose to be.

"_I wish we had more time..." _

His tone carried far more meaning then the words. Lois knew he felt as she did, but this was all they had.

Perhaps all they would ever have.

Lifting her hand she found his face and turned, her hands caressing gently until her arms found their way around his neck. Lois didn't want to leave his embrace.

Searching again for the man she had fallen for, the man who could light up a room. She found instead someone broken, who stirred her soul in a completely different way, but the love for him was the same.

Clark didn't want to take his eyes off her, afraid Lois would vanish, that again he'd be alone.

Her presence moved him, the cold detached part of him that he had built up over time began to thaw. It may never completely leave, but he could not be with her and not feel.

He had told her he had died when she left and the words had been spoken with a truth bared from the very depths of who he was. The death had been long and painful... confusion, pain, regret, grieving, failure, anger ...all led in the end to becoming someone who refused to feel.

Failure from the choices he made, the cost of the life such as his father Jor-El's, the loss of so many other lives because he failed, the trust of his friends because he could not cope.

The anger came mostly when he thought of the one woman who could have helped, but never showed. Charged full of kryptonite and capable of fighting Zod, or at least could try to. Yet Lana never came... it had angered him, but somehow he had never been surprised.

What stung the most, in recent months, was never knowing what happened to his mother. Was Martha one of the many causalities in Washington or among the scattered groups of survivors?

It was his inability to find Lois, her absence that had been the hardest to bear -the grief and heartache, realizing that he had missed his chance. That he'd never see her or know what had happened. Knowing he was robbed of the chance to tell her how much she meant to him and that he was sorry for all of it. Now he looked into the hazel eyes he had longed for and knew he'd have to let her go again.

Today she could very well die as she fought alongside them, because he knew he could not protect her. His only hope was that if they failed to stop Zod, that she'd live and he'd survive long enough to send her back and prevent all of this from ever happening.

He had no pretense of seeing her again past today. Possibly even beyond this moment.

The feeling of pain and coming loss passed between them. Eyes unable to tear away, he felt her hands message the back of his neck, the unspoken question. He could not answer her; there were no words to tell her of what was to come. He wanted to say that he'd see her later, that it would be okay, that he was sorry she was here. But a part of him wasn't sorry... her coming back into his life brought back just enough humanity in him to give this one last try.

Most of all,he wanted to tell her he loved her, that their night together wasn't just because today their lives might end. It meant more to him than that, she meant more... she always had.

He saw her eye's flicker to his lips for barely a second and brought his mouth to hers. Wanting her to know all he felt...that she made him feel again.

Lois clung to him, bringing to the kiss the same feelings, saying back what neither could say out loud. When they parted,his eyes held hers and again she wanted to say something, to ask him to tell her how he was going to defeat Zod... why bringing back the yellow sun would help him. But for once Lois Lane had no voice. It was lost just as the old Clark was. Though she could see and feel in him an improvement from before he was still distant, something had broke inside him.

She could only hope that if they survived this day, somehow won this battle, that maybe Clark would come back, not the shell but the real man - that they would have their chance. She didn't want to keep looking in his eyes and seeing what she saw now, nor did she want to give him up.

Swallowing against the fear and sorrow, she leaned the side of her face into his.

They stayed like that for several minutes - breathing in union, not wanting to let go. When she pulled away,she felt the wetness on her cheek and realized he had shed a tear. Grabbing his face one last time Lois kissed him, felt him pull her closer.

Words between them both finally came, as she held his face in her hands.

"_Don't...Smallville...please!"_ A soft plea.

"_It's_ _because of you I can..."_the words came out pained.

Sighing, and unable to grasp the significance of what he said, Lois pulled away defeated, but able to understand that it had to be done.

Lois had never had any real regard for the 'live or die together' mentality. Yet in that moment, as her hand took his and Clark led her away, she believed in it with all her soul.

She refused to live in a broken world without Clark. 

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